Beard 'druff's Top 10 Unheralded Songs of 2009

I'll get to a top ten albums segment later this month, but for now I'm going to present a different list: 10 songs that didn't receive much attention this year that I happen to love.

Basically, that rules out shoo-ins like "Two Weeks" and "Stillness Is The Move," but doesn't exclude cuts from great albums (see #2). So without further ado...

10.













Peter Bjorn & John -- "Just the Past" -- Living Thing

From a review I wrote for The Voice earlier this year:

"The paintings around me/ they don’t understand me/ I’m a bit too early/ I’m seen as development,” Peter Morén sings on “Blue-Period Picasso,” as if to justify the growing pains that plague Living Thing. The problem with Peter Bjorn & John’s fifth album is not that it’s “too early,” though, but that it’s still overshadowed by Writer’s Block, the Swedish indie-poppers’ highly lauded, ironically-titled third album. Whereas “Young Folks” will probably be the only song Kanye and the general consciousness will ever associate to their name, Peter Bjorn & John could be doing worse. Much, much worse.

"Just the Past" is the one song that justifies the argument in my mind: it's the languid, ascending melody in the pre-chorus and the metallic, Kraftwerk-y percussion that really bring it to life. I want to groove with the gallop but I am too lazy to get out of the hammock.

9.












The Veils -- "The Letter" -- Sun Gangs

I'm aware that you'll probably get to the end of this one and go "huh?". I caught it live in New York, couldn't get the chorus out of my head, and then unfortunately found the recording to be a bit of a let down. Still, Finn Andrew's urgency is more than evident here; this is the sort of intense (but not overwrought), emotive music I'm happy to endorse. When the Veils come back to America, mark your calendar.

8.













The Juan Maclean -- "Happy House" -- The Future Will Come

2009 doesn't strike me as a particularly great year for dancing (though it did give us "Combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bell"), with the notable exception of this Juan Maclean episode. Granted, it's the kind of slow-building hip-churner we've come to expect from most homegrown DFA bands, but that's no reason to discredit the execution: the delicious diva-disco piano riff, the punchy bassline, and the phrase "Launch Me Into Space" all make this one worth the requisite exercise. Or, as a girl I don't know put it at a party I DJ'd recently: "WHAT IS THE NAME OF THIS SONG??!!!!"

(R.I.P. Jerry Fuchs)

7.












City Center -- "Bleed Blood" -- City Center

City Center started as a side project for Fred Thomas (Lovesick, Flashpapr, Saturday Looks Good for Me) and has evolved into a collaboration between him and Ryan Howard. One of the features of the outfit is a pretty prolific blog with demos, mixtapes, photos, and more -- a facet of performance that easily connects City Center's aesthetic with Bradford Cox and Atlas Sound (Fred has basically admitted as much), though we can always throw in the arbitrary Animal Collective/Panda Bear reference. "Bleed Blood" is the most well-developed track on the group's debut, with the consistently coherent and engaging sample choices, and an interesting arc to boot. Welcome to the next 10 years of music.

6.












Sufjan Stevens -- "Movement III: Linear Tableau With Intersecting Surprise" -- The BQE

Oh, Sufjan -- you're so existential. I know this project supposedly spurred the artistic crisis you currently find yourself in, but is this really an impasse worth obsessing over? Should the habits of the general public redefine the artist's approach to a medium and the very form itself? Plenty of people make "albums" that aren't diced into 3-5 minute nuggets, so what are you complaining about? I like this suite, don't get me wrong, especially this third movement (whose brilliance gets smothered by the stupid fourth movement), but I don't think it's existential-crisis-worthy. It's just great music, same as it ever was, same as it will be. So let's celebrate instead!

5.












The Big Pink -- "Too Young To Love" -- A Brief History of Love

The Big Pink get my official vote for "most slept on pop act of '09." A Brief History of Love is chock-full of big hooks and bravado, and my guess is that they'll be ready for the festival circuit by the time their second album comes around (third at worst). In reality, "Too Young To Love" is more effective in the context of the album, but that's the case for most of its songs. If you don't like it now, sleep on it and try again--it took me a few listens to realize how great its simplicity really is.

4.











Paul Westerberg -- "Gimmie Little Joy" -- PW & The Ghost Gloves Cat Wing Joy Boys

Call me a blaspheme: beyond "Unsatisfied" and "I Will Dare," Paul Westerberg's music has never moved me much until PW & The Ghost Gloves Cat Wing Joy Boys found its way into my rotation. This song alone (which features one of the catchiest chorus melodies I've heard all year) makes me want to revisit the entire Replacements discography and check out Westerberg's other solo output. It's really just the way he says "Easy"--you can't teach charm like that.

3.












Smith Westerns -- "Tonight" -- Smith Westerns

This song lives and dies by the guitar hook, which is definitely part of the appeal. Like "Dreams" and "Be My Girl," "Tonight" is spazzy summer camp bliss, like the bonfire in that one Girls song or Real Estate's "Atlantic City Expressway." To the band's credit, it just wouldn't be as fun without the teenage swag: you can feel the smiles on their faces each and every time they obliterate that downbeat ("Uh!").

2.












Animal Collective -- "Also Frightened" -- Merriweather Post Pavilion

Okay, so maybe this doesn't belong here, but then again, it totally belongs here. So much emphasis has been placed on "My Girls" that this gem (my personal favorite on the album) has been completely undercut. Perhaps more so than any other piece on Merriweather, "Also Frightened" really transports you to a different space: "Venture my way into the dark/Where we can sweat/One takes one by the hand." (And though I haven't read any thing to confirm this) It seems like another song about parenting for Noah, as addressed to his wife: "Are you also frightened?" In many ways, it's a more affecting question/sentiment than getting "adobe slats for [your] girls" or "strap[ping] a stroller to [your] back."


1.











Animal Hospital -- "And Ever..." -- Memory

Hands down my favorite piece of the year, without question. It's a sprawling, intricate, transcendent, and generally epic chunk of post-rock that melts my mind each and every time. The ripply snare drum fill; the droney wraiths; the barbed guitar treble; "Today, Tomorrow, and Forever": it all amalgamates into a reach-for-the-fences surge of energy that somehow, inexplicably, channels the spirit of its ambitions into something in-fucking-effable.